39
In defending the ability of human reason to know God, the Church is expressing
her confidence in the possibility of speaking about him to all men and with all
men, and therefore of dialogue with other religions, with philosophy and
science, as well as with unbelievers and atheists.

40
Since our knowledge of God is limited, our language about him is equally so. We
can name God only by taking creatures as our starting point, and in accordance
with our limited human ways of knowing and thinking.

41
All creatures bear a certain resemblance to God, most especially man, created
in the image and likeness of God. the manifold perfections of creatures - their
truth, their goodness, their beauty all reflect the infinite perfection of God.
Consequently we can name God by taking his creatures" perfections as our
starting point, "for from the greatness and beauty of created things comes
a corresponding perception of their Creator".15

42
God transcends all creatures. We must therefore continually purify our language
of everything in it that is limited, imagebound or imperfect, if we are not to
confuse our image of God --"the inexpressible, the incomprehensible, the
invisible, the ungraspable"-- with our human representations.16
Our human words always fall short of the mystery of God.

43
Admittedly, in speaking about God like this, our language is using human modes
of expression; nevertheless it really does attain to God himself, though unable
to express him in his infinite simplicity. Likewise, we must recall that
"between Creator and creature no similitude can be expressed without
implying an even greater dissimilitude";17 and that
"concerning God, we cannot grasp what he is, but only what he is not, and
how other beings stand in relation to him."18